Editor’s Note: This was originally published for FANGORIA on September 28, 2006, and we’re proud to share it as part of The Gingold Files. These days, when one hears the phrase “independent zombie film,” it’s hard not to get a bit cynical and think it’s gonna be just one more George A. Romero fan turned moviemaker rehashing the mythos on a lower budget. Some of the homegrown ghoul features from the last decade or so have been good, many have not, but very few have attempted to truly rethink the formula, and present the undead as something other than pale and/or disfigured creeps staggering about and munching on human flesh. One of those few is Last Rites of the Dead, the new production from the gang who created Strange Things Happen at Sundown (writer/director Marc Fratto and producers Brandi Garfi, Frank Garfi and Andrew Dantonio), and as in that vampire/Mafia opus, they tackle an ambitious, wide-ranging narrative, and largely succeed. This is a zombie movie with a lot of differences—smart and scary and, best of all, genuinely dramatic.